Quote:
Originally Posted by Stillstrong78
Hi everyone, I am 14 months post Divorce with parenting orders in place. Basically, I left him after a decade together because he became emotionally abusive after our daughter was born and had very little interest in being a father.
Here's my issue. My ex, who I later found out had a double life (a mistress for 1 year), would not keep up with our verbal visitation agreement and missed months at a time, filed for 50/50 physical care of our child with his new fiancé (the mistress).
The court process was long, emotionally and financially draining. It ruined me financially but I was ordered primary custody.
Our parenting orders are now 14 months old but my ex is not keeping to them, nor co-parenting with me. He ignores me when I try to discuss parenting matters, both face to face and over email. Sometimes he will send anger fuelled emails in return.
I don't understand why someone would file for joint physical custody, spend a ridiculous amount of money on legal fees and stretch the court process out 2 years, but still act like an irresponsible parent after the papers are sealed.
My daughter is suffering and refusing to see her father, but I still make her go (as per orders), I feel terrible and want to support her through this but its difficult when her father wont discuss anything with me. He even refuses to allow her to go to counselling. I don't understand his motive?
I appreciate any opinions and insight.
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Welcome. I was a divorced single mom for almost 10 years too, so I do feel your pain.
How old is your daughter, you didn't say.
I can explain what you don't understand, the custody battle wasn't because HE WANTED to be a parent, it was either about satisfying the mistress who either wanted to play mom, didn't want him paying child support to you or wanted to do something to hurt you, OR it was HIM wanting to hurting you. He didn't keep up with with the visitation to begin with, so it wasn't about him missing full time care of his child.
One thing, if you have primary custody, why does he have any say about her going to counseling. Maybe he wont take her when he has the visitation, but you should be able to schedule around that.
I know you are trying to "coparent" but sometimes you cant, and it doesn't sound like he wants to. What kinds of things are you trying to discuss with him that he gets angry with you about? I would suggest that unless it is something that directly involves him, like him having to pick her up for his visitation at a different location, ie a sports event, then I wouldn't bother talking to him about it.
When my husband and I split up, I was determined that he was still going to be part of her life. I grew up seeing very little of my mother after my parents divorced and I didn't want my daughter going through that. But it was always a huge fight to get him to show up at all, let alone on time, or not bring her home early. Child support was always a huge battle, until I took it out of his hands and had the state deduct it from his paycheck. So unless it involved visitation of support, I didn't bother discussing with him. Now, my daughter knows her dad well, she knows his issues because she saw them first hand, not because I said bad things about him. He continues to be selfish and self centered, but I did my best at letting her know him personally. He can never say that I kept her from him or anything is my fault. Is it worth it? I suppose it is, but it was hell going through it.
I wonder if you need to back away from him a bit?